Kornit Digital Ltd., a worldwide market leader in digital textile production technologies, today released its 2020 Impact and Environmental, Social, and Governance (“ESG”) Report. This inaugural report affirms Kornit’s commitment to achieving specific ESG goals. This includes the way Kornit conducts business, creates meaningful impact in local communities, and achieves environmental sustainability, in addition to how Kornit will continue to build a diverse and inclusive company culture, foster employee growth and development, and empower fair and safe labor practices globally.
“Our vision is to boldly transform the world of fashion and textiles for a better, more sustainable planet,” said Ronen Samuel, Kornit Digital’s Chief Executive Officer. “This report serves as our roadmap to achieving this vision.”
Mr. Samuel continued, “The fashion industry is unfortunately responsible for severe ecological damage, producing nearly 20% of global wastewater each year and over-producing an average of 30% as an integral part of its ‘normal’ course of doing business. We are laser-focused on changing that trajectory. Sustainability is top of mind at Kornit, in our spirit and in practice, every single day.”
In addition to enabling eco-friendly production processes with technology and consumables that use less water, reduce waste, and minimize the carbon footprint, Kornit technology solutions enable sustainable production on demand, which eliminates overproduction of apparel and other textile goods. A 2021 Life Cycle Assessment conducted on two flagship products, the Kornit Atlas MAX and Kornit Presto S, demonstrated that relative to traditional analog processes, Kornit’s digital production systems used up to 95% less water and 94% less energy, and produced up to 83% less greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for the Presto S system and up to 93% less water and 66% less energy, and produced up to 82% less greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for the Atlas MAX system.
Based on this study, in addition to past sustainability performance results and strategic projections for business growth and market expansion, by 2026 Kornit Digital’s sustainable on-demand solutions are expected to enable the production of approximately 2.5 billion apparel items in a responsible manner to deliver:
- Zero overproduction: By moving the industry to on-demand manufacturing, Kornit will help eliminate the estimated 1.1 billion apparel items overproduced using traditional production methods, based on an industry average of 30% overproduction. This is about 1 apparel item for each and every person living in Europe and North America – saved.
- Zero water waste: In addition to eliminating overstocks, Kornit-enabled production on demand will support saving an estimated 4.3 trillion liters (1.1 trillion gallons) of water. This is the estimated amount of drinking water needed for the entire U.S. population for 11 years.
- Reduced CO2 emissions: By enabling sustainable on-demand production, consuming less energy, and generating less waste, Kornit will prevent an estimated 17.2 billion kilograms (37.9 billion pounds) of greenhouse gas emissions, compared to traditional manufacturing methods. This is equivalent to the estimated amount of carbon dioxide emitted from circumnavigating the entire planet with a car nearly 2,400 times.
Furthermore, the report outlines Kornit’s commitment to achieving KPIs that address waste, chemicals, GHG emissions, energy, product development, employee training, diversity and inclusion, and the company’s supply chain.
“While we are proud of our progress towards achieving the goal of being a technology leader for environmental, social, and responsible corporate citizenship, and empowering the global fashion industry to elevate its creative possibilities while shrinking its ecological footprint, we know there is more work to be done. This report holds us accountable to our vision of providing the efficient, conscientious, uncompromising on-demand capabilities our stakeholders, employees, customers, and the global marketplace demand. These KPIs reflect Kornit’s core values, embedded into every aspect of our business,” Mr. Samuel concluded.
The report generally follows Global Reporting Initiative Standards core reporting framework option and Sustainability Accounting Standards Board reporting standards for the Professional and Commercial Services sector.
